


Graphing for Truth

by ljs



Category: Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Episode Tag, F/M, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-09-05
Updated: 2014-09-05
Packaged: 2018-02-16 05:57:57
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,578
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2258382
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ljs/pseuds/ljs
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>An episode tag for "Into the Dalek."</p><p>Clara and Danny going for drinks; the Doctor relaxing in the TARDIS, and the consolations and revelations of mathematics and music.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Graphing for Truth

The door shuts behind them. Clara can barely hear its solidity, the sharpness of the click of connection, over the murmurs and clinking glasses and bad 80s music of the pub nearest their school.

Danny unslings his briefcase like it’s a rifle, she thinks as he moves, much less hesitantly than he did within the walls of the school. It might be a weapon too, she thinks –

“Over there?” he says, nodding toward what passes for a quiet corner. “I’ll fetch the drinks. What would you like?”

She is too self-controlled (not a control freak, thank you very much, part of her mind snaps) to say what she would really like. He’s so solid, so handsome, so wounded around the eyes – “A half, please. Not bitter.”

“Yes,” he says, and it’s like sunlight at the end of a cloudy day. “Right, then. I’ll just go get that.”

“Go on then,” she says. ( _I do sound like a school teacher_ , that part of her mind observes. Part of her is always separate, always fragmented, always observing.)

“Yes,” Danny says, and for a long moment there is nothing but murmurs and clinking glasses and the warmth of the look they exchange.  
………………………………………..

“Go wherever you like,” the Doctor says, waving at the TARDIS console. “You always do anyway.”

A hum of approbation, a chitter of coordinates being reset. The lights dim everywhere except over his wingback chair.

“Thank you,” he says, and makes his way there.

First stop is the decanter of Scotch on the shelves. He used the sonic screwdriver to make a sort of cage for it, seeing as the TARDIS is prone to a bit of turbulence now and again….His hand stills on the decanter. He thinks of cages, of controllers and lost memories, of that Dalek voice recognizing his hatred.

He pours himself a splash of Scotch. A short splash. He’s not as steady as he likes to be now.

Seeking comfort, he sits in his armchair and takes his first sip. It’s warm, warm as explosions and death – No. Not something he needs to dwell on.

It’ll come back, he knows. War doesn’t seem to be avoidable.

But he needs something to occupy himself now. With his free hand he reaches to the nearest shelf and takes down a tablet of graph paper.

Drawing and mathematics are two of his favorite things, he’s found. For a breath his fingers twitch, his knees ache, and he feels the cold draught from the window in that… bedroom-thing, at Madame Vastra’s, after the last change. But he flattens his hand against the tablet, anchors himself, knows where he is even if he’s not entirely sure what he’s made of. (Hatred, says the voice of the Dalek in his mind. Bollocks, he thinks in response.)

He takes another drink, and then collects his pen from his inside coat pocket.  
…………………………..

“Coffee,” Clara says again, laughing.

“Yeah. Well, my head hurts a bit, and… yeah.” Danny curls a finger around the handle of his mug, but doesn’t lift the coffee to his mouth. He’s sporting that head-desk look again.

She wants to put her hand on his. But really, she’s already hit more than her quota of pushiness today – today? Yes, despite the fluttery nature of time around the Doctor, it’s still today. She contents herself with a smile, a breezy “Sensible,” and a taste of her own drink.

When she presses her lips together to catch a stray bit of ale, he’s watching her, not entirely shyly. She smiles with wet lips, and observes his interest.

But almost immediately he’s fidgeting again. He doesn’t need more caffeine, she thinks. However, stronger than amusement and a little flicker of…something she’s not ready to define…is her wish to make him feel better. He’s not the Doctor, she doesn’t need to give the poor gorgeous man hell.

“Tell me something about maths,” she says.

“Really?” His smile is adorable, half-wise, half-abashed.

“Really. Tell me something you love about maths.”

“You’re tricky,” he says, his voice deepening, “changing clothes in cupboards, changing the subject now. I heard what you added that time.”

“Sharp boy,” she says. “Right then. Tell me _anything_ about maths.”

He hesitates, and then reaches for his briefcase, and pulls out a tablet full of graph paper.  
………………………………………

The Doctor is long past the first simple equation, the x and y of the easily solved. Fingers all but flying over the paper, he is plotting out a path unlimited by boring two dimensions. All it takes is one more swerve.

The TARDIS jolts a little, and his hand slips, and his mind slips from now to then, so many thens…

River, all curls and cleavage, smiles at him in a nightclub lit by candles and the light of three moons. “One of them isn’t a moon, sweetie,” she says, and he snaps “I know that,” and she says “No, you didn’t,” and leans forward to caress his hand and then steal his napkin. They plot out the anomaly on that bit of linen. He uses her lipstick to mark the dimensions, to draw the lines. Later she kisses him in the midst of a flight of blunt-tipped arrows, and everything is biting-sweet.

Breathless, bedraggled, Donna thrusts a sheet of torn graph paper in his face. “Explain yourself, space boy, and stop mucking about with the bloody curve!” she says, and he grabs on and sees new truth through the steps she makes him take over seemingly familiar ground.

Much earlier, it’s Nyssa and Adric play-fighting with an Alzarian number system, while the Doctor and Tegan are play-arguing by the console, and the light of time is bright and cheerful everywhere, everywhere, it’s a different kind of sweet and a different kind of true.

“Come on, Grandfather,” Susan says in an empty room, “show me how it works—“

Back in the now, the Doctor stabs his finger with the pen.

The fleeting pain wakes him to the quiet. It’s too quiet. He needs to move amongst the living.

His ink-stained finger covering the furthest point on his graph, he looks at the nearest shelf. Something’s sticking out – right. One of his completed collection of _NME_ , he pulled them out when he redecorated. He recognizes the issue.

Right, then. Now.  
………………………………………..

“Give me a name and value for this point,” Danny says, his pencil poised over the almost finished parabola they’ve created.

They’ve made a game of it, over his coffee and her half, working out mirror-curve perfection on paper, concocting silly names and values for each axis and unit. This final point is near the intersection of Descartes (his nomination) and Marcus Aurelius (hers).

“So what’s the connection between Stoicism and Cartesian thought?” she says, sliding nearer. She pulled her chair around the table when he started drawing, and now is shoulder to shoulder with him. He smells so nice, a cologne all rich and woody, and she can feel his arm muscles flex as he draws.

He sends her a look under long lashes. “Um, right, well. Philosophy bloke like Descartes…Maybe _Passions of the Soul_?”

“ _Passions of the Soul_ ,” she echoes. She thinks of a Dalek expanding its consciousness, she thinks of loss and a changed body, she thinks of fragments and leaves and drift. She thinks of souffles.

She feels herself here now, though, warm, a bit lustful, buzzed, amused. And Danny’s eyes are beautiful, half-wise, half-abashed, even as he starts to pull away.

She puts her hand on his. “Perfect,” she says, and they smile at each other. This is a fixed point, she thinks. This matters.

………………………………………

The Doctor opens the TARDIS door and steps out into a chilly, damp December night.

December 11, 1982, England. A fine evening for some music.

He heads toward the Brighton Conference Centre, which is emblazoned “The Jam’s Last Concert.” All reviews said later it was terrible, the Doctor knows, but as soon as he found this coat after he regenerated, he also found that he rather likes a bit of Mod and Mod Revival music – and while the “last concert” thing is a fixed point, maybe he can get backstage, have a little talk with Paul and Bruce, get them to stop fighting long enough to put on a proper show.

His DMs crunch over discarded paper as he strides toward the venue, his coat flutters open in the wind, and he smiles –

Until a skinhead, one of a little knot of bruisers, pushes himself off a wall and steps into the Doctor’s path. He looks like he’s ripe for some nasty business. “Oi, Grandfather!” the idiot says.

The Doctor doesn’t stop walking. “Not your grandfather, sunshine. Get it right.”

The boy – for it’s only a boy, shivering in the cold, his hatred not enough to warm him – takes a step back, and then another. The Doctor can feel the insecurity underneath swagger and bravado. Doesn’t mean there’s less chance of violence, though.

So the Doctor stops. Smiles, properly. “Get it right, sunshine,” he says again, and he means to be calming rather than threatening. “Try to do better.”

But this rattles the boy and his mates all the more. They push and shove, moving backward. “You’re mad,” the boy says.

“You know, I’ve heard that,” says the Doctor, and he strides on, humming a little under his breath.

This is and is not a fixed point. He may not be a good man, but he can do better.

This matters.


End file.
